Dog Friendly Santa Monica Travel Guide

This post was sponsored by The Georgian Santa Monica, but as always all opinions are 100% my own!

Happy Monday! I can’t believe how close we’re getting to Christmas, can you? Since I’m lucky enough to have a remote job that allows me to work from anywhere, and Jerry is able to work from home sometimes, we decided to spend December with my family in Washington for the holidays!

Since the ticket prices came out to be about the same and we were itching for a mini vacation, we booked ourselves a 3 day layover in California on our way from Nashville to Seattle. As we’re going to be away for the whole month of December, we of course have Euler with us, so naturally he got to join in on our little California vacation! If you’ve ever traveled with a dog before (especially a dog too big to sneak anywhere), you know that it can be challenging to find dog friendly things to do! Luckily for us, California was surprisingly dog friendly and had tons of amazing restaurants and bars that allowed us to eat with Euler on the patio! Not only that, but because of Euler we ended up at The Georgian Hotel, which was absolutely incredible and we would recommend to anyone traveling to the Santa Monica area, dog or no dog.

Click through the slideshow to see a bunch of pictures of Euler looking majestic AF on the beach! lol

The first thing that struck me about The Georgian was of course, the color! It’s bright blue and gorgeous on the outside, and definitely stands out! If you’ve ever been to Santa Monica you probably recognize the building! I know I remembered it from when we visited Santa Monica two years ago while we were staying in Venice Beach! The second thing that struck me (before even seeing the rooms) was the location! It is directly across the street from the famous Santa Monica Pier and within walking distance to a ton of amazing restaurants and bars— you could spend days just exploring the area on foot. We spent a ton of time on the beach, and Euler LOVED getting to swim in the ocean for the first time!

Our first night in town it was pouring down rain! We were a little worried about finding a dog friendly place for dinner because usually dogs are only allowed on patios, but we lucked out and found Blue Plate Taco (which was recommended to us by the concierge at The Georgian) and it was incredible. We almost went back the next day, it was that good! They had a dog friendly heated and enclosed patio, so even though it was raining we were nice and warm and dry, and their margaritas were SO good! Since we were so hungry from traveling all day, this was the one restaurant I didn’t think to take a picture at, but it was adorable and the food was amazing! I think that Jerry and I both got their fish tacos!

The next day, we walked around and explored the area for a while before ending up at Stout Burgers and Beer for lunch! They also have an enclosed dog friendly patio, so they were the perfect lunch spot! So perfect that we went back again for happy hour (half priced burgers? Yes please!) later that day! They had a ton of really interesting burger options, and they were all so good! The first time we went I got The Six Weeker and Jerry got the Stout Burger, and the second time we went we split the loaded tots and the Morning After burger. They were all so good we weren’t able to choose a favorite! (actually, that’s a lie, I LOVED the loaded tots! And I think if I had to choose, I’d probably go with the Six Weeker, but it would be a pretty tough decision).

For dinner, we headed into LA and met with some friends at Rock Sugar! They unfortunately are not dog friendly, but Euler was so tuckered out from playing in the waves all day that he went right to sleep before we left! Jerry and I were still pretty full from our happy hour at Stout, so we split a Pad Thai and it was the perfect amount of food. Afterwards we went out in Hollywood. First we went to The Roosevelt which was absolutely gorgeous, but unfortunately since it was a Tuesday night there wasn’t a ton going on so we ended up leaving and heading to Davey Waynes instead. Unlike The Roosevelt, Davey Waynes was absolutely packed with a line out the door! Davey Waynes has a cool 70’s theme and played the best music. You also enter through an old refrigerator door, which I thought was super cool! It was a bit cold out that night, but they had a heated patio, so as long as you were near a heater it was bearable.

The next morning, we got brunch and mimosas at The Veranda, The Georgian’s built in restaurant. I’m not sure why, but I am usually bit skeptical when it comes to hotel restaurants and I was blown away by how good the food was! We ordered the ceviche (pictured above) and I seriously was tempted to order another one! It was so good that it was gone in about 5 minutes. Then Jerry ordered the Steak and Eggs, and I ordered the Eggs Benedict (pictured below) both of which were amazing, and I don’t think either of us had any leftovers! Another perk: The Veranda has a patio so it’s dog friendly, too!

After our breakfast, we went up to the room to get some work done! While this was our vacation, we still had to take a bit of time to make sure we were getting everything done since things are pretty busy with the holidays coming up, so we couldn’t afford to completely take a break! But work is wayyyy better with an ocean view! Also, check out how gorgeous the rooms at The Georgian were! I love that there were doors separating the bedroom from the living area, so Jerry and I were able to go off into separate areas of the suite to get our work done without distracting each other! Euler, on the other hand took pride in being a distraction… lol

Once we got our work done, we headed down to the pier because I wanted to do some shooting and Euler was getting restless and wanted to swim! It was so nice being able to walk for less than 5 minutes and be on the beach! Later that night, we walked with Euler around Santa Monica Place, a little shopping area a couple of blocks away. There was so much to do within walking distance of us, we hardly had to use Lyft at all! Unlike the day before, unfortunately we apparently did not tire Euler out enough, because we were planning on meeting up with some friends that night and going to a bar, but Euler refused to let us leave. We ended up just taking Euler with us to the friends apartment, and never actually made it out to the bars. He had a blast though, because anytime he’s around anyone who has had a drink or two he gets TONS of attention, and if there’s anything Euler loves its attention! Haha

We ended up getting back that night at around 2 am, and we were starving! So we walked around the block to Joe’s Pizza and picked up a few slices to go! Being from New Jersey, Jerry is pretty picky about his pizza (and claims that there is no good NY style pizza in Nashville) so the fact that he gave Joe’s Pizza his stamp of approval means it was pretty good! My favorite was the white pizza, and Jerry loved the Margherita. We had actually gone to Joe’s for lunch that day, too, so we were really excited to see that they were still open when we got back! They don’t exactly have a full patio, but they do have a couple of tables set up outside where we were able to sit and eat with Euler when we went earlier in the day.

The next morning was our last, sadly, so we spent some time walking around on the beach and letting Euler play fetch in the ocean one last time. When we got to the pier, we were super excited to stumble upon Smorgasburg! I had heard of it and always wanted to try to go when we’ve been in New York, but so far we had never been able to make it work, so I was surprised and excited when we walked right into it by accident! We were about to head to one last brunch to say bye to our friends, so we didn’t go crazy but we did stop at the Milk Bar truck and finally got to try their Crack Pie! It definitely more than lived up to the hype! We loved it so much that we’re definitely going to make a point to grab some more next time we’re in New York or LA.

The last stop of our trip was The Sunny Spot, which you may remember from my last California blog post here! When we were in California last, we stayed at The Kinney in Venice Beach, which was directly across the street from The Sunny Spot and it became an instant favorite. It has the cutest decor and a great atmosphere, and everything we’ve gotten there has been amazing! Add in the fact that they’re super dog friendly, and it was the obvious last stop to finish up our perfect California trip. We ordered the bottomless mimosas (because, duh) and I got the Eggs Benedict (clearly I have a favorite brunch food) while Jerry got the Brisket Hash. Both were amazing, and we even got a scrambled egg for Euler because he’s extremely spoiled.

And that’s a wrap on our perfect, dog friendly three day California trip! I absolutely love traveling with Jerry and feel like when we travel is when we are at our happiest together! We’re at a point where every time we travel anywhere we’re like “We should totally move here someday!” and we definitely felt that way on this trip! The warm December weather may have been a pretty big factor in that, too! I hope this post was helpful in planning your next California trip! We’re already planning our next trip back, so if you have any suggestions of places to go or things to see next time, let us know!

XOXO,

Olivia